Swiss Doubly Defeated as Canada Head to World Junior Semis

Drake Batherson was traded from Cape Breton to the Blainville-Boisbriand
Armada a few hours after scoring two goals in Canada’s 8-2 quarterfinal
win over Switzerland on Jan. 2. (Matthew Murnaghan/Hockey Canada Images)

The Swiss needed a vote of confidence heading into Tuesday’s IIHF
World Junior Championship quarterfinal against Team Canada, but they got
the opposite from their head coach.

When asked what sort of game he was expecting out of the Canadians,
Switzerland coach Christian Wohlwend opted to take the brutally honest
and highly cynical approach.

“A Canada team who dominates us again,” Wohlwend told the media. “We
are far away from them. They’re faster, they’re bigger, they’re
stronger, they can shoot better, they can pass better, they can do
everything better.”

While there’s something to be said about blunt honesty, the way
Wohlwend opted to throw his players under the bus before they even had a
chance to take a face-off likely put the Swiss forward on the wrong
foot.

“How many first rounders do they have?” he asked the media, before
being told Canada has seven first round draft picks. “And the rest in
the second round? And one in the fourth round who’s played the most NHL
games so far? So what do I want to tell the guys? We just battle, try to
battle — We have one in the fourth round too, one. The rest aren’t
drafted.”

Yes, Canada boasts some of the most top-tier talent at the
tournament. Yes, the Swiss were convincingly ousted in an 8-2 loss, just
like Wohlwend suggested they would be. But it still doesn’t validate
Wohlwend’s complete lack of faith in his players. There’s no disputing
the fact that the Swiss were outmatched on almost every avenue, but it’s
been proven time and again at this tournament that upsets can and do
happen, and believing they’re possible is the first step in achieving
them.

Being an unarguable underdog isn’t rare in hockey — especially
considering the game is still growing in countries like Switzerland
— but there’s a difference between being honest and selling your players
short.

Take last year’s Stanley Cup playoffs as an example. The Ottawa
Senators were seen as the underdog on every prognosticator’s list
entering their Eastern Conference final series against the Pittsburgh
Penguins, and they lost — but not until double overtime in Game 7.

Sens head coach Guy Boucher knew it was going to be an uphill climb
for his players, and he didn’t mince words after dropping Game 5. But he
also never admitted defeat until his team had lost all four games.

“We know they're a better team,” Boucher told reporters. “Everybody
knows that on the planet. They're the Stanley Cup champions. They're the
best team in the league. That's no secret.”

It’s a loud statement for the opposing coach to make in a narrow 3-2
series, but Boucher made it clear he was only referring to the matchup
“on paper.” Boucher insisted defeating a team like last year’s Penguins
was “about putting our strengths on the ice.”

When it comes down to a single game, it’s not about who the better
team is in the grand scheme of things, it’s about who can pull out the
victory when it matters most — and after beating Carter Hart twice in
Tuesday’s quarterfinal, it’s safe to say Wohlwend underestimated the
Swiss players.

Czech Republic head coach Filip Pesan presented another professional
way to approach the question after pulling off a stunning upset over
Finland in Tuesday’s quarterfinals.

Entering Thursday's semifinal against Canada as an overwhelming
underdog, Pesan simply suggested the pressure is all on the Great White
North. And he’s right. No one is expecting the Czechs to pull off their
third upset of the tournament — they’ve already taken down Russia in
the group stage and Finland in the quarterfinals — and that fact alone
places Canada into a pressure situation.

It’s not just Canada’s goal to defeat lower-seeded teams, taking home
hardware is arguably seen as a responsibility to the Canadian coaching
staff and their players. The Czechs enter the semifinals knowing they’ve
already beaten the odds.

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